Finding Peace in the Heat: 4 Ways Summer Can Help You Heal From a Crucible

Finding Peace in the Heat:

4 Ways Summer Can Help You Heal From a Crucible

by Gary Schneeberger 

June 27, 2025

We tend to think of summer, and try our best to experience it, as a season of freedom — vacations, sunshine and a slower pace of day-to-day life. But if you’re still somewhere between the midst and the aftermath of a crucible that has sent shockwaves through your world, the season’s bright veneer can feel like a cruel mismatch to the storm still roiling inside you.

Maybe you’re navigating the fallout of a divorce or the death of someone you loved deeply. Maybe you’ve lost a job you were off-the-charts passionate about, one that fit your talents and values as snugly as your favorite ballcap. Perhaps you walked away from a career that you felt threatened your health or integrity. Or you could be still working through the emotional toll of a serious illness. Whatever your crucible, its heat can linger long after the immediate crisis cools.

Summer, however, with its longer days and built-in pauses, can be a powerful ally in your pursuit of peace. But that peace doesn’t come passively. Healing isn’t something you drift into on a pool float. It’s something you work toward—intentionally, almost-certainly imperfectly, one day at a time. Here are some hard-earned truths and practical action steps for using this season to reflect, regroup and reclaim the perspective, and the hope it brings you, that your crucible didn’t happen to you, it happened for you.

Pause with Purpose

Many of us, in the wake of difficulty, rush forward—back into routines, work, relationships—anything to avoid sitting still with our pain, regret and anxiety. Summer gives us the space to pause. Use it.

But don’t confuse stillness with stagnation. Purposeful pausing means setting aside time regularly to reflect on what you’ve been through — to do the “soul work” necessary to turn your worst day into your greatest opportunity. That might mean journaling on the back porch as the sun sets. Or taking a solo walk in the park with nothing but your thoughts and the breeze. Ask yourself: What am I feeling today? What am I avoiding? What still hurts? Naming the ache is the first step toward healing it.

Here are 4 summertime opportunities to beat the heat of a crucible that still sears:

1. Redefine Rest. When we’re wounded, rest is not optional—it’s essential. But real rest is more than binging Netflix or collapsing into bed early. It’s about what fills you, not just what numbs you.
This summer, ask yourself: What kind of rest do I need today? There’s physical rest—like naps and sleep. But there’s also emotional rest (setting boundaries), creative rest (reading poetry, painting) and spiritual rest (prayer, meditation, silence). Schedule rest like it matters—because it does.

2. Seek Gentle Community. Crucibles can be isolating. Friends don’t always know what to say, and we may not know how to ask for what we need. But healing rarely happens in a vacuum. It happens when we lean into our relationships with those we call our fellow travelers. Use the slower social tempo of summer to reconnect in ways that don’t require you to “be OK.” Have a friend over for iced tea with no agenda. Join a book club or volunteer at a local event—somewhere you can simply be yourself, free of the self-imposed baggage of feeling “less-than” that a tough crucible can leave us feeling like we’re dragging around with us. Sometimes the most healing thing is to be seen, without having to explain. Your closest family and friends, your true allies, won’t require you to be anything or anyone but yourself.

3. Find Small Anchors of Joy. When life shatters, joy can feel hard to come by at best, irresponsible to nestle into at worst. But healing doesn’t mean denying what hurts—it means remembering that beauty and pain can coexist. That there is hope to be found inside heartache.
Make a list of small things that bring light into your days: a favorite summer fruit, an old song that makes you smile, the feel of grass under bare feet. Build them into your days with intention. These small moments won’t fix your pain—but they can remind you that healing is possible.

4. Choose Hope (Even When It’s Heavy.) Healing isn’t linear, and peace doesn’t arrive in a finger snap like a summer storm. It comes slowly, unevenly. But summer offers us space to be deliberate with our hearts. To reflect. To rest. To say, even in the midst of deep wounds: I am still here. I am still healing. I am going to see this painful process through until I turn my trial into triumph.
Hope is not the absence of pain. It’s the belief that something meaningful can come from that pain. That’s a lesson we at Beyond the Crucible have learned from our own journeys from setback to significance, and the truth the guests on our podcast have shared with us, no matter how different the circumstances of their crucibles may be from each other.

Let this summer be your season of unrushed return—one breath, one step one sunrise at a time. You don’t have to be in a mad dash. But you do have to move. Peace isn’t found. It’s forged. And summer, with all its heat and hush, can be where your healing begins.